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Prez poll: Foreign Secretary meets Maldivian leaders
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, October 17
Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh today met former Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed amid concerns over attempts to derail the electoral process in the Indian Ocean Archipelago.

Sujatha, who has been sent to the Maldives by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ahead of Saturday’s rescheduled presidential elections, would also be meeting other political leaders, including President Mohamed Waheed, who withdrew from the elections earlier this week expressing doubt over the credibility of the poll.

Speaking to the media after meeting the Indian diplomat, Nasheed, Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) candidate, said New Delhi believed that the election would go ahead and there would be a new President in office in the Maldives by November 11.

Saturday’s election process is fraught with uncertainty after the Progressive Party of Maldives (PPM) refused to withdraw a case filed in the apex court challenging the candidacy of Nasheed.

PPM party candidate Abdulla Yaameen had come in second with 24 per cent votes in the first and now annulled round of presidential poll held on September 7. PPM council member Ibrahim ‘Wadde’ Waheed filed a petition in the Supreme Court on October 10 that states as grounds for stripping Nasheed's candidacy his “outright criticism towards Islam and imposing Islamic Sharia in the Maldives” and his criticism of the judiciary. In a statement earlier this week, the Indian Government called on all Maldivian stakeholders to work towards holding a “free and fair elections followed by a smooth transition on November 11”.